CP Text: The United States Federal Government should allocate all necessary additional funding Zimbabwe for the prevention and treatment of Human Immunodeficiency Virus/Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, if Zimbabwe successfully implements aid accountability reforms and meets United States benchmarks for this reform.
But poor countries suffer not so much from insufficient aid as from the poor quality of their governance. Even if the United States and other countries were to become much more generous in their foreign aid, little good would be done for the poorest countries of the world, which are undermined by corruption. A 2004 World Bank report on corruption noted that bribery has become a trillion-dollar industry, causing far more wealth to flow from poor countries to rich countries than these poor countries receive in foreign aid. Whereas an estimated trillion dollars of foreign aid has been given to poor countries since World War ii, at least 5 percent of the world's domestic product (amounting to $1.5 trillion in 2001) goes into the financial markets of wealthy countries in the form of money laundering. According to a recent study of 30 subsaharan countries, those countries’ ruling elites had private overseas assets equivalent to 145 percent of the public debts that their countries owed, and about 80 cents on every dollar borrowed flowed back to the West as capital flight. Robert Guest, the Africa editor of the Economist, estimates that this amounts to about 40 percent of Africa's privately held wealth.
And in its current state, giving foreign Aid to Zimbabwe will only create more corruption and oppression, and cannot possibly solve for HIV/AIDS
Walter Williams, Professor of Economics at George Mason University, 2006 (“Western Aid is no Boon for Corrupt African Nation.” Deseret news.) http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4188/is_20060628/ai_n16505942
Zimbabwe provides an excellent example of why foreign aid, as a way out of poverty, is a fool's errand. Salem University, Winston- Salem, N.C., professor Craig Richardson explores this further in "Learning From Failure: Property Rights, Land
Condition CP 1NC
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Reforms and the Hidden Architecture of Capitalism," a paper written for the American Enterprise Institute's Development Policy Outlook Series (2006). Not that long ago, Zimbabwe was one of the more prosperous African countries. Richardson writes, "Few countries have failed as spectacularly, or as tragically, as Zimbabwe has over the past half decade. Zimbabwe has transformed from one of Africa's rare success stories into one of its worst economic and humanitarian disasters." It has the world's highest rate of inflation, currently over 1,000 percent. To put this into perspective, in 1995, one U.S. dollar exchanged for eight Zimbabwe dollars; today, one U.S. dollar exchanges for 100,000 Zimbabwe dollars. Unemployment hovers around 80 percent. Its financial institutions are collapsing. The specter of mass starvation hangs over a country that once exported food. What's the cause? President Robert Mugabe blames domestic and foreign enemies, particularly England and the United States, for trying to bring about his downfall. Of course, according to Mugabe, and some of the world's academic elite, there's that old standby excuse, the legacy of colonialism and multinational firms exploiting the Third World. The drought is used to "explain" the precipitous drop in agricultural output. Then there's AIDS. Let's look at drought and AIDS. Zimbabwe's next-door neighbor is Botswana. Botswana has the world's second highest rate of AIDS infection, and if there's drought in Zimbabwe, there's likely a drought in Botswana, whose major geographic feature is the Kalahari Desert, which covers 70 percent of its land mass. However, Botswana has one of the world's highest per capita GDP growth rates. Moody's and Standard & Poor give Botswana an "A" credit rating, the best credit risk on the continent, a risk competitive with countries in central Europe and East Asia. Botswana, compared to her other African neighbors, prospers not because of foreign aid. There's rule of law, sanctity of contracts, and in 2004, Transparency International ranked Botswana as Africa's least corrupt country, ahead of many European and Asian countries. The World Forum rates Botswana as one of Africa's two most economically competitive nations and one of the best investment opportunities in the developing world. Botswana shares a heritage with Zimbabwe, for it, too, was a British colony. What it doesn't share with Zimbabwe explains its success: the rule of law, minimal corruption and, most of all, respect for private property rights. No amount of Western foreign aid can bring about the political and socioeconomic climate necessary for economic growth. Instead, foreign aid allows vicious dictators to remain in power. It enables them to buy the allegiance of cronies and the military equipment to oppress their own people, not to mention being able to set up "retirement" accounts in Swiss banks. The best thing Westerners can do for Africa is to keep their money and their economic development "experts."
Condition CP 1NC
Conditional Aid is necessary to solve corruption, the barrier of effective aid
The Post, December 12, 2005 [L/N] [SL]
TI holds that significant corruption and poor governance in countries that receive aid are widely recognised as major obstacles to the realisation of development goals. Weak national integrity systems characterised by poor public financial management, a lack of political accountability, access to information about development strategies and civil society monitoring, according to TI, offer numerous opportunities for the misuse of aid resources by corrupt
elites, public officials and others. It noted that the siphoning of aid away from legitimate development objectives is often coupled with the mismanagement of domestic resources, and has debilitating effects on the development of a number of recipient countries. "In Nigeria, for example, where two-thirds of the country's population live in abject poverty, it was recently estimated that the country's past leaders stole a total of GBP 220 billion between 1960 and 1999. During the same period, the country received substantial development assistance from both multilateral and bilateral donors and now owes almost GBP 20 billion in external loans," states the report. TI proposes that all efforts to promote good governance and counter corruption should be an integral part of all development aid strategies. Such strategies, TI continues, should address not only the risk of corruption in recipient countries, but also the dangers of corruption within the development aid system itself. Secondly, TI recognises that conditions-based approaches be an important means for promoting good governance and countering corruption.
Lack of aid is not the problem in Sub-Saharan Africa. Corrupt governments prevent the aid from reaching the people that need it
Herbert H. Werlin. Independent Consultant. 5/13/07. “Corruption and Foreign Aid in Africa” http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6W5V-4G5BK00-1&_user=4257664&_coverDate=08%2F31%2F2005&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000022698&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=4257664&md5=cfc37bc4970c7ae48fd20fac1d4b3a78
But poor countries suffer not so much from insufficient aid as from the poor quality of their governance. Even if the United States and other countries were to become much more generous in their foreign aid, little good would be done for the poorest countries of the world, which are undermined by corruption. A 2004 World Bank report on corruption noted that bribery has become a trillion-dollar industry, causing far more wealth to flow from poor countries to rich countries than these poor countries receive in foreign aid. Whereas an estimated trillion dollars of foreign aid has been given to poor countries since World War ii, at least 5 percent of the world's domestic product (amounting to $1.5 trillion in 2001) goes into the financial markets of wealthy countries in the form of money laundering. According to a recent study of 30 subsaharan countries, those countries’ ruling elites had private overseas assets equivalent to 145 percent of the public debts that their countries owed, and about 80 cents on every dollar borrowed flowed back to the West as capital flight. Robert Guest, the Africa editor of the Economist, estimates that this amounts to about 40 percent of Africa's privately held wealth.
And in its current state, giving foreign Aid to Zimbabwe will only create more corruption and oppression, and cannot possibly solve for HIV/AIDS
Walter Williams, Professor of Economics at George Mason University, 2006 (“Western Aid is no Boon for Corrupt African Nation.” Deseret news.)
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4188/is_20060628/ai_n16505942
Zimbabwe provides an excellent example of why foreign aid, as a way out of poverty, is a fool's errand. Salem University, Winston- Salem, N.C., professor Craig Richardson explores this further in "Learning From Failure: Property Rights, Land
Condition CP 1NC
(CONTINUES FROM LAST PAGE)
Reforms and the Hidden Architecture of Capitalism," a paper written for the American Enterprise Institute's Development Policy Outlook Series (2006). Not that long ago, Zimbabwe was one of the more prosperous African countries. Richardson writes, "Few countries have failed as spectacularly, or as tragically, as Zimbabwe has over the past half decade. Zimbabwe has transformed from one of Africa's rare success stories into one of its worst economic and humanitarian disasters." It has the world's highest rate of inflation, currently over 1,000 percent. To put this into perspective, in 1995, one U.S. dollar exchanged for eight Zimbabwe dollars; today, one U.S. dollar exchanges for 100,000 Zimbabwe dollars. Unemployment hovers around 80 percent. Its financial institutions are collapsing. The specter of mass starvation hangs over a country that once exported food. What's the cause? President Robert Mugabe blames domestic and foreign enemies, particularly England and the United States, for trying to bring about his downfall. Of course, according to Mugabe, and some of the world's academic elite, there's that old standby excuse, the legacy of colonialism and multinational firms exploiting the Third World. The drought is used to "explain" the precipitous drop in agricultural output. Then there's AIDS. Let's look at drought and AIDS. Zimbabwe's next-door neighbor is Botswana. Botswana has the world's second highest rate of AIDS infection, and if there's drought in Zimbabwe, there's likely a drought in Botswana, whose major geographic feature is the Kalahari Desert, which covers 70 percent of its land mass. However, Botswana has one of the world's highest per capita GDP growth rates. Moody's and Standard & Poor give Botswana an "A" credit rating, the best credit risk on the continent, a risk competitive with countries in central Europe and East Asia. Botswana, compared to her other African neighbors, prospers not because of foreign aid. There's rule of law, sanctity of contracts, and in 2004, Transparency International ranked Botswana as Africa's least corrupt country, ahead of many European and Asian countries. The World Forum rates Botswana as one of Africa's two most economically competitive nations and one of the best investment opportunities in the developing world. Botswana shares a heritage with Zimbabwe, for it, too, was a British colony. What it doesn't share with Zimbabwe explains its success: the rule of law, minimal corruption and, most of all, respect for private property rights. No amount of Western foreign aid can bring about the political and socioeconomic climate necessary for economic growth. Instead, foreign aid allows vicious dictators to remain in power. It enables them to buy the allegiance of cronies and the military equipment to oppress their own people, not to mention being able to set up "retirement" accounts in Swiss banks. The best thing Westerners can do for Africa is to keep their money and their economic development "experts."
Condition CP 1NC
Conditional Aid is necessary to solve corruption, the barrier of effective aid
The Post, December 12, 2005 [L/N] [SL]
TI holds that significant corruption and poor governance in countries that receive aid are widely recognised as major obstacles to the realisation of development goals. Weak national integrity systems characterised by poor public financial management, a lack of political accountability, access to information about development strategies and civil society monitoring, according to TI, offer numerous opportunities for the misuse of aid resources by corrupt
elites, public officials and others. It noted that the siphoning of aid away from legitimate development objectives is often coupled with the mismanagement of domestic resources, and has debilitating effects on the development of a number of recipient countries. "In Nigeria, for example, where two-thirds of the country's population live in abject poverty, it was recently estimated that the country's past leaders stole a total of GBP 220 billion between 1960 and 1999. During the same period, the country received substantial development assistance from both multilateral and bilateral donors and now owes almost GBP 20 billion in external loans," states the report. TI proposes that all efforts to promote good governance and counter corruption should be an integral part of all development aid strategies. Such strategies, TI continues, should address not only the risk of corruption in recipient countries, but also the dangers of corruption within the development aid system itself. Secondly, TI recognises that conditions-based approaches be an important means for promoting good governance and countering corruption.